


Golden

by feverbeats



Series: g series [5]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-06-17
Updated: 2008-06-17
Packaged: 2017-10-17 11:50:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/176574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/feverbeats/pseuds/feverbeats
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Yeah, we just have to explain the fact that I'm sleeping with their son and we're golden," George says, utterly miserable.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Golden

By the time summer arrives, George has gotten used to the smell of Lee's jumpers, dark and soft and warm, and he's not ready to peel the layers off. The sun gets warmer and starts to feel like a bruise. Shutting the curtains would be weird and avoidant, but isn't he allowed to be, just a little bit?

Five minutes into June, Lee rolls out of bed and opens the window, letting in the heat and the moonlight. “It's summer,” he whispers, grinning at George.

George rolls over, shutting his eyes so the white light doesn't hurt them. “It'll be summer tomorrow, too.”

The next morning, though, there's no getting around it. George could hibernate all winter, but now he has to face the rest of the world. There's a whole lot of world out there to face right now, too, and he knows he's been hiding long enough that life has been piling up outside. Everyone is still rebuilding and readjusting, and everything is taking on a new shape. George isn't sure he'll ever get used to it, but maybe Lee will make it easier. The winter wasn't actually bad, and he isn't sure if he should feel guilty or happy about that.

They open the joke shop up again, and Ron comes around to help out. He's doing well, which isn't really a surprise. He has Hermione to straighten him out. While George and Ron wait on customers, she spends her time talking to Lee, which makes George nervous. She might put ideas into his head.

“So,” Ron says carefully while they're shifting around boxes in the back, “You and Lee.”

George wants to bang his head against a wall. “Yeah?”

“Well . . .” He pauses awkwardly, a box balanced on his shoulder, his ears going red. “You know.”

“If even _you've_ noticed--” George says, feeling obvious and stupid.

“Well, no,” Ron says. “I mean, Hermione mentioned it. _She_ thought it was obvious.” He sounds a little accusing.

George laughs, loving how normal it feels. “Right, well, that explains it. She always was a sharp one. Should have known you couldn't work it out on your own. But yeah. Me and Lee.”

“Mum'll be pleased,” Ron says, and George wants to hug him.

When they come back out into the shop, Hermione and Lee are talking to Angelina, and George takes an involuntary step back. He hasn't spoken to her in nearly a year, when she said she couldn't look at him. She looks amazing. “Er . . . hi,” he says, waving at her vaguely, feeling stupid. She was always closer with Fred. Of course.

She turns to him, and her smile doesn't fade, just hitches a little. “George,” she says, “Hi.” She crosses the room and pulls him into a hug. “Listen,” she says, “I've been weird. And I know I've been weird. Sorry.”

George squeezes her tighter. “No hard feelings.” Maybe the summer won't be so hard after all.

Hermione beams around at everyone as though she arranged the whole thing, and George wouldn't put it past her. “Well,” she says, “That's nice. Now, Lee . . .”

Lee looks at George sheepishly. “Oh, uh, yeah. Hermione and I were just talking . . .”

“And Angelina agrees,” Hermione puts in.

“Oh no,” Ron says, “What've you cooked up now?”

Hermione shoots him a nasty look. “Hush, Ron. We were just saying, I think it's about time that Lee told his family about the two of you. I mean, _your_ family has mostly all worked it out by now.”

“And _I_ worked it out _years_ ago,” Angelina says. “Before the two of you did, probably.”

Lee shrugs at George. “With friends like these . . .”

George nods miserably. He's met Lee's family lots of times, and he's always liked them well enough. Worse, they've always seemed to like him, meaning it'll only be a bigger blow when they decide they'd rather curse him into oblivion than ever seen him again.

“Maybe it won't be so bad,” Angelina says.

“Yeah, we just have to explain the fact that I'm sleeping with their son and we're golden,” George says, utterly miserable.

*

Lee's house feels different this time around. It's one thing to come over and play Quidditch when you're a couple of teenagers, but a meet-the-parents scenario is much more terrifying, especially when George has the feeling it can't exactly go well.

In fact, it doesn't even have a chance to get started.

“I'll go in first,” Lee says, pale with forced nonchalance. “Try and explain things a bit. The thing is . . . The thing is, they're really a bit set on . . . Well, I grew up in . . .” He gives up, gesturing around them.

George looks, too. It's a small Jamaican neighborhood, not so very rich as all that, but proud in its shabbiness. There's a reason George and Lee always got along. Now, though, George feels like an outsider, and given how nervous Lee is, he has good reason to. Lee's family is very traditional, and if George had payed more attention at Hogwarts, he would have known how goddamn tricky this would be.

Lee sighs. “Sorry. I'm just going to do this. Be right back.”

George waits on the doorstep, feeling a bit like unwanted luggage, and when the raised voices start, he slumps against the side of the house, defeated. Lee always joked around at school about kissing blokes, and how it could get him killed at home, but George never took it seriously on either count. Now he just feels like an arse.

A few minutes later, Lee emerges, slamming the door. “Never fucking _mind_ ,” he says. “I don't know why I never tried. They . . . I don't know, George. It's just not in their world, you know? It's not the same. And I don't care. I don't.”

George wraps his arms around Lee instinctively, ready to punch someone. “Fuck the lot of them.” He'd usually offer revenge in a situation like this, but it's always different with parents. He'll have to go with comfort instead, something he's not so good at. “Listen, let's go by Mum's. Get some cake or something.”

Lee smiles against his cheek. “Your mum makes the best cake I've ever had.”

George relaxes.

*

Later, at home, they sit on the roof and watch the sun set over Diagon Alley. Lee seems to have been cheered up by visiting with George's family, but he's still a bit quiet.

Eventually he says softly, “That was hard.”

George runs his finger over Lee's chin. “Yeah. It was. But we've done harder stuff.” This past year has been unbearably, unbelievably hard, and they made it through alive and intact. They'll make it through this.

Lee smiles his brilliant smile. “Yeah, I know.” He laces his fingers through George's and his hands are warm and rough, and George leans against his shoulder. “I know it'll probably never be all right,” Lee says softly. “I mean, with Fred being gone.”

George looks at the sun over the rooftops of Diagon Alley, and he remembers buying books here a kid, getting into trouble here when they were supposed to be at Hogwarts, all of it with Fred. He thinks about Lee's words, and he decides that he could believe them and let himself feel like that forever, or he could hold Lee's hand tighter and . . . “You're wrong, mate,” he says.


End file.
